Will Thomas: The Limehouse Text

“Good thinking, lad. No telling how long a message would take to reach Scotland Yard from here. Off with you, then.”

I was up the stairs and out the door, keen to serve my employer before I remembered about assassins and flying bullets. The alleyway in front of Ho’s has no means of entrance or egress and nothing to shelter behind. Should the fellow appear at the far end with his pistol or rifle, he could shoot me at his leisure. Luckily for me, the killer had vanished without a trace.

It took only five minutes to locate a telegraph office, it being a matter of following the wires leading down toward the docks. This was certainly not a picturesque part of London. The salt air of the Thames was doing a fine job of warping the clapboards of the buildings and stripping the paint from the graying wood. There were no gaily painted Chinese signs or dragons or pagodalike structures that proclaimed Limehouse was the Oriental quarter of town. It made a satisfactory attempt at being anonymous.

I waited while the message was transcribed and sent and then returned to the restaurant. It was a cold afternoon in February, and as I walked I noted that the sun produced a good deal of light but almost no heat. I went in to find that nothing was standing guard over the inspector’s body but the four lanterns. I continued into the restaurant.

Barker and Ho were seated at one of the tables, drinking tea amid a pile of abandoned dishes. “Help yourself to food, lad. There’s plenty going to waste in the kitchen,” the Guv said.

“No, thank you, sir,” I said. I’d lost my appetite. Instead, I poured myself a cup of lukewarm tea.

“Mr. K’ing must be told,” Ho insisted as I set my cup on the last clear foot of table.

“Oh, come now,” my employer responded. “Why must I inform him? Am I to take all these rumors seriously? They say he has been here for a hundred years and is responsible for half the evil done in London.”

“I believe the last part,” Ho maintained. “He has extorted money from me for years. Two cooks were employed by me at his written request, and though they only worked for me a day or so, I have been forced to pay their salaries ever since.”

“What?” Barker growled. “You never told me this. I am surprised you didn’t snap their necks and hand them back their heads.”

I chuckled at this last remark and it even brought a rare smile to Ho’s lips, but it was true. Despite his stout stomach, Ho could handle himself well, of that I was sure. Ho gave a shrug.

“So, what was K’ing’s group called?” I asked. “This Blue Dragon something or other?”

“Blue Dragon Triad,” Barker answered. “Most of the members are present or former employees of the Blue Funnel Line that steams between Liverpool and Shanghai. London is their layover, so the line is responsible for the Chinese being here in the first place. But is the Blue Dragon a part of any real triad in China, or does K’ing exert influence here based upon his own ability to hold power?”

“What exactly is a triad?” I asked.

“They are criminal fraternities that control the opium trade and other interests in China. They began as benevolent organizations whose purpose was to overthrow the Manchu dynasty. They have been corrupted from their original purpose, and their influence is beginning to grow beyond China. There has been evidence of the group’s expansion into Formosa, Manila, Sydney, and other port towns. Now K’ing claims his own little branch here. Does he do anything else besides extort money?” he asked Ho.

“I have heard a few people have disappeared without a trace. On the other hand, he has funded some festivals here and given money to the Asiatic Aid Society. I believe he will be sponsor of the New Year’s festival in a few days.”

“New Year’s?” I asked. “It is February.”

“Chinese New Year, lad,” Barker said. “February fifteenth.”

I was at my post in the alley outside Ho’s door fifteen minutes later when a four-wheeler clattered to a stop and disgorged Inspector Poole and three constables so alike in size and appearance they might all have been stamped in a press. I raised a hand and he nodded brusquely in my direction. Terence Poole was one of Barker’s closest friends and a member of his physical culture classes at Scotland Yard until the bombing last year by the Irish Republican Brotherhood had put an end to them.

“Where is he?” Poole asked in a monotone. Whether he meant Barker or Bainbridge, I did not ask, merely pointing to the door at the end of the alleyway. If I was in any doubt as to the inspector’s mind, he made it perfectly clear a moment later. Coming upon a small piece of crumbled brick on the ground, he gave it such a savage kick it spun across the alleyway and shattered when it hit the wall. Though he had never been to Ho’s before, he pulled open the door and headed down the unlit steps like a regular.

For a moment the passage was filled with the sounds of our ten shoes. Finally reaching the lamps around the inspector’s body, he ignored Barker and Ho, who were now both sitting on the bottom step, and went down on one knee, examining the face of his late colleague.

“Ah, Nevil,” he said, as if the man were still alive. “Who’s done this to you, old fellow, and however shall I tell the missus?”

Barker stood and came over to us, but all he got for his efforts was a glare from Poole, as if this were all our fault.

“How did he get in this godforsaken tunnel?” the inspector asked.

“We were coming out of Ho’s when he was shot from the other end.”

“Is it always this dark?”

“Sometimes it is darker. The regulars often come through here in pitch darkness.”

Poole gave him a look, as if he had come upon a club of eccentrics. “Who was here when the shots were fired?”

“Llewelyn, Bainbridge, and me, and the killer, of course.”

“Did you see anything?”

“No,” Barker stated. “The only light was from a single lamp in Thomas’s hand, which was shot out by a second bullet from over there.”

“So, he was on the stair behind me as you all walked toward him, about twenty-five yards with wavering light. Not a bad shot.”

“Very professional,” my employer agreed.

Poole looked about at the small, overlapping circles of light created by the lamps. “This glass is crushed. It looks like a herd of elephants has been through here.”

“Yes, well, I’m afraid the restaurant was full, and the only way of egress is this tunnel. Ho thought it best to run them through quickly.”

“This is a murder site!” Poole barked. It was obvious he was looking for someone to blame. “I do not care how long they had to wait, I do not care if they had to sit up there all day, you shouldn’t have let them walk across evidence!”

“These were not the sort of individuals-”

“I don’t bloody care!”

There was an awkward silence for a moment. I thought Poole was being unfair. Actually, it was Ho who had sent the patrons off, and the circumstances were perfectly understandable. Also, as Barker tried to say, the clientele was not the easiest to marshal or contain. Some were criminals, some political revolutionaries, and others lived in the shadowy world of exiles, spies, and secret societies. It was amazing that Ho had gotten them all to obey him.

“I take it this is the owner,” Poole finally said, jerking a thumb in Ho’s direction. “Does he speak English?”

“When it suits him.”

“Here, you!” Poole called, which was not a safe way to address the Chinaman. Ho had upper arms the size of a good roast joint and I’d seen him throw a meat cleaver with some accuracy. “Did anyone come in after Inspector Bainbridge and these two entered the tunnel? I was wondering if he might have secreted himself among the crowd and left with them.”